


Grantaire Was A Charming Young Man; Enjolras Was Just Terrible

by haplessmedstudent



Series: Hospital AU (That No One Asked For) [1]
Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hospital, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-26
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-08-17 11:54:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8142844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haplessmedstudent/pseuds/haplessmedstudent
Summary: Enjolras is one of those distressingly competent bastards in the Emergency Department. He meets Grantaire the Intern for the first time.(AKA the Hospital AU [that no one asked for] is now a series, which raises the possibility of an actual E/R relationship eventually being depicted. Yes.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Things about this fic:
> 
> 1\. Technically this comes before 'ER For Emergency Room (And This Ship)' but was written second. You don't need to read that one first for this to make sense.  
> 2\. I am basing this off of real-life experiences, although the Musain Medical Centre (MMC), the characters and the shops mentioned therein are not based on any real-life situations, places or people. Any similarities you find are purely co-incidental.  
> 3\. FMGs - Foreign medical graduates; ED - Emergency Department; EM - Emergency Medicine; ER - Emergency Room  
> 4\. There's one Gray's Anatomy reference.  
> 5\. Now beta'd by the lovely BrooklynBoy :D (http://archiveofourown.org/users/Brooklynboy)

Enjolras was not what you’d call easily distracted, but even he could surprise himself, at times.

Half a year into his residency proper, the man was at the top of his game. He found that he enjoyed the chaos of the city’s premier hospital. They got a variety of people — patients who needed the expertise of the Musain Medical Center’s attendings, elderly folk who had grown up in the area before it was gentrified, immigrants who tended to be less wary of the multi-racial set of employees (the MMC had an equal-opportunity policy for FMGs) — and Enjolras was thriving. This was what he was looking for. He had found med school to be a bit of a monotonous grind filled with overly-privileged academic types, and his name school was more research-oriented than anything. At the MMC there were always new cases to see, plenty of visiting attendings to learn from, the occasional exchange student to trade stories with. There was never a dull moment, and Enjolras had always been a bit of a live wire.

It was on one such day when things were generally going as usual -- he received two transfer cases for Valjean without incident, Lamarque was the attending on duty that night, and he actually read the three chapters he told himself he had to finish — that he was paged to the call room.

Enjolras sighed and made a U-turn from the cafeteria. He'd been counting on getting lunch on time today, too.

Inside he found Jean Prouvaire, fifth year extraordinaire and the most mild-mannered assistant chief across all departments, looking up from his iPad as Enjolras came in. 

“Hey, Jean. You called?”

Jean gestured for Enjolras to sit down. His fine features were frowning slightly as he took in Enjolras’ disheveled appearance. “I like how all your scrubs are the same color and no one knows for sure when you take breaks, because you always look the same.”

Enjolras frowned back and raised an eyebrow. Jean was a good surgeon and supervised them well, but he said the strangest things sometimes. “It’s standard-issue, sir. Can’t be fussed to pick different patterns, honestly.”

Jean made an agreeing noise and swiped the iPad around. “Yes, of course, I remember first year. Can’t pay me to go back there,” he laughed, gesturing to the screen at the same time. “Anyway, business. Since you’re swapping with Courfeyrac’s rotations starting this week, I figured I should show you the curriculum for the interns you’re going to be handling. There’s two of them, Grantaire starting Trauma tomorrow, then Emergency Med after four weeks. Pontmercy has the same rotations in opposite order.” He opened Keynote and allowed Enjolras to scroll through. 

“I’m supposed to give them a quiz a week, Jean?”

“It wasn’t my idea. Combeferre wants them to finish the whole of Tintinalli’s Section 22.”

Enjolras hummed a little in understanding. Combeferre, the chief resident, had an instinct for effective teaching methods. “Oh well, in that case. I guess four quizzes each it is, and maybe even a journal appraisal. What do you think?" 

"Hmm. Nothing like critical appraisal to make them students hate you more."

"I'll make them do two, then," Enjolras said with a smirk. "Is that all? I was just heading to lunch, if you want to come along.”

Jean finished gathering up his materials and shoving his long hair into a bun held together by a pen, as Enjolras watched on, still marvelling at the intricacy of his hair, like always. You wouldn’t think mild-mannered, artsy-looking individuals like Jean Prouvaire could flourish in Trauma, but Enjolras found it better to avoid assumptions like that. Honestly, stereotypes didn’t get you very far — Cosette Fauchelevent was tiny and blonde, and she was in Ortho. 

“Let me come with you. I could use lunch. Is it meatloaf day at the mess?” 

The two walked with the speed of people who had at least five other things to do before lunch ended. Enjolras quirked a rueful smirk in response. “It’s almost always meatloaf day at the mess, sir.”

“But it’s free meatloaf, and Houcheloup always has that special sauce.”

“That she does.”

~~

The next morning came with dawn, as mornings do. Enjolras hadn't been on call yesterday and was therefore able to go to his condo, read four more chapters of Schwarz (his second go at it), make a dent in his paper’s review of existing literature, do 45 minutes of plyometrics and finish two vegetarian shawarmas for dinner. He slept from 2 am to 7 am like a baby. He clocked in at 7:45.

Courfeyrac whined into his shoulder as he drowsily shucked off his used OR clothes. “I hate how fresh you look even if I know you were probably doing muay thai or capoeira or who-knows-what at midnight.”

Enjolras laughed good-naturedly at his friend, a fellow first year Trauma resident and last night’s on-call on-duty. “I’ve never actually done any of those, ever. Also, I still have another breakfast sandwich, if you’d rather avoid the caf rush.”

Courfeyrac was still wrangling his coat out of the depths of the locker. Enjolras didn't know why the other man didn't invest in more hangers, but Courfeyrac seemed to enjoy the struggle. He was good at sighing dramatically, in any case. 

“No, thank you. You say breakfast sandwich and I think of McMuffins, when I know you mean turkey, exactly one ounce of cheese and mustard made with flax.”

“That first mustard was an experiment. I’ve gotten better at it since, you know.”

Courfeyrac finally managed to find his coat and shrugged it on, good-naturedly clapping Enjolras on the back. “See, this is why God made sure you were going to be annoyingly good at one thing, like surgery. So you could suck at everything else in life. Like taste.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes and gave Courfeyrac a noogie, messing up his cap-head even more. (He never used to give noogies until he met Courfeyrac. There was something about that man.)

Courfeyrac gave him the evil-eye in response. “I’ll ignore your playground bullying, and instead point out that I heard you’re going to have interns for the first time, which makes me jealous, because you don't deserve nice things. I’m not getting them until December. ”

Enjolras shot him an incredulous look even as he put on his own coat (which was actually almost newly-washed. Still fresh from two days ago. Pity he couldn’t say the same for his jeans, which were so worn they had their own kneecaps built-in.) “I still have no idea how you manage to be excited at the prospect of people essentially going through us for a curriculum requirement, and probably still a bit green around the gills, too.”

“Meredith Gray was an intern when she met McDreamy.”

“Exactly.”

Courfeyrac shook his head and threw an arm around Enjolras shoulders. He had to reach, because he was ‘average-height’ and Enjolras was apparently overgrown and overfed. ‘Like a prized bull’, were his exact words. “This other thing you suck at: finding potential paramours. I mean, look at me. The only reason I don’t have Combeferre or Jean knocking on my doors is because I can’t choose between them. Who can blame them, though?”

“Last I checked Combeferre was dating Dr Thenardier, and Jean is out of your league." 

"Maybe Eponine likes to share."

"Maybe I wish I were in Pathology."

"Ha! Ha. But point is, I’m Courfeyrac, I'm awesome, and I literally transcend preferences, hierarchies, and monogamy.”

“I’m sure you do," Enjolras mocked, gesturing to Courfeyrac's unkempt five o'clock shadow, curls frizzing from a night under an OR cap and prominent eye-bags. (Courfeyrac had allergic conjunctivitis; his eyebags came with mini-purses.) "I’m also going to be late for my interns’ orientation if I listen to you delude yourself any longer.”

“Just you wait. I will laugh my actual ass off if any of these interns end up being a Meredith Gray.”

Enjolras threw his half-sandwich at Courfeyrac’s head as the other man walked off. The bread was dense and multi-grain, and he hopes it hit him hard.

~~

“Good morning, guys. I’m Dr. Enjolras, your monitor until December. I’ll be orienting you today, and then we’ll let you go so you can attend the ED’s orientation with Dr Bahorel, and then one of you comes back to me later to go on duty tonight,” Enjolras said, striding into a minor function room outside the Interns’ call room, where two people awaited him. He didn't look up yet, just laid out charts and his bag on the table in front. He kept talking. 

“I’m glad you guys matched here. The MMC may be excellently-staffed, but it’s under-staffed as well, and we could always use the extra hands, and the patient load is intense but so, so satisfying, and the mess hall has semi-decent coffee, too,” he continued, and at the end of this run-on, looked up.

He looked up and first spotted a lanky fellow seated on his right, freckles visible even from this distance, with big eyes that somehow reminded him of Bambi. This man was dressed in uniform with a white coat and matching burgundy scrubs. His kit boasted a color-coordinated set of a pedia and adult stethoscope, a sphygmomanometer, a thermometer, a pulse oximeter, a neuro hammer and what looked like Harrison’s Manual of Medicine. He had an Internal Medicine vibe going on (but really, assumptions got you nowhere, Enjolras reminded himself) and seemed to be easily startled.

“You are?”

“My name is Marius Pontmercy,” the man said, giving a nervous half-wave.

“Of course.” He turned to the left then, spotted the second intern, and had to remember social cues. 

See, Enjolras was not what you’d call easily distracted, but even he could surprise himself, at times.

The second intern — Grantaire, Enjolras presumed— was sitting there looking both calm and amused, a quiet sort of excitement in his face. And what a face it was. See, Enjolras was both specific and simple in his aesthetics: good skin plus good bone structure equals beauty. Skin was important, because it was a connective tissue that reflected how well one took care of oneself, and this, he read in anthropology text once, was a subliminal message to the hindbrain for a good choice of mate. Evolutionary advantages of good health, and all that. He also appreciated bone structure; his Classics club taught him how to seek out proportionality in anatomy, and appreciate it.

And now Enjolras was distracted — the fine prominence of a brow, the long nose, the thin, smiling lips, the precise jut of his chin. Dark, curly hair, worn roguishly lengthy, parted to the side. The hint of a well-kept stubble. Pale skin. A small tattoo saying something Elvish or Latin, Enjolras couldn’t be sure, encircling his forearm like jewelry. The dip of a collarbone above the interns’ sea-green scrubs that somehow brought out a hazardously deep blue to his eyes — and dear god, where was this purple prose coming from?

Enjolras rotated his shoulders and twisted his neck in an attempt to recenter himself. For goodness sake -- he'd graduated magna cum laude with a double major from an Ivy League. He used to be a nationally-ranked debater. He won state championships in tennis when he was in high school. He once did an emergency re-intubation inside the CT scan.

When he met Dr Lloyd Old for the first time, the pioneer of targeted cancer therapy, Enjolras shook the man’s hand and almost drooled on it.

\-- Because Enjolras was not easily distracted, but once he was, he tended to turn the distraction into a special kind of focus. And then proceeded to be a dork about it.

“So you’re Grantaire, then, my intern for this month?”

Grantaire grinned an easy smile, probably oblivious to the effect he was having on Enjolras. He got up — his head cleared Enjolras eye-level, but barely — and shook his hand. “Yessir, Grantaire, ED intern today, aspiring pediatrician otherwise. I look forward to working with you.”

Enjolras shook his hand firmly. He felt calluses in specific places — power lifting? didn’t look like it — or he was an avid drummer? Maybe he used pencils a lot. Maybe he did billiards. Who knew what Grantaire could do with his hands? 

(Wouldn’t he like to know.)

Oh god, Enjolras was making innuendoes in his head. This was bad. It was like having Courfeyrac provide live commentary of his day.

“Alright, then. Well, this won’t take long. Basically the objective of this rotation is…”

The intern turned to sit back down, and Enjolras made a concerted effort not to stare at certain body parts. But what a solid set of back-pockets, wow.

He launched into Jean’s presentation and tried not to look at Grantaire more than Marius, except looking at Pontmercy was honestly like looking at an overwhelmed puppy as it learned how stairs work for the first time. Meanwhile Grantaire seemed excited at the prospect of bloodshed and mayhem that was an ER duty, took notes in his smartphone, and was pretty and maybe exactly his type. The intern also kept on interrupting to make suggestions for the curriculum, demanded an OSCE on top of the quizzes, and asked why they were still going with textbooks instead of newly published journal guidelines. The cheek of it, and he looked so pleased about finding points of contention, too. 

This next four weeks with Grantaire were either going to be fun and distracting, or aggravating and distracting. Either way, Enjolras was going to be a Grade A asshole through it all, he could feel it, and Grantaire seemed the type to enjoy riling up assholes. 

Enjolras would probably enjoy being riled up, too.

...Courfeyrac was going to give himself a hernia laughing about this.

 Damn it.

~

**Author's Note:**

> Next time: more e/R, swear.


End file.
